At last a chance for odd couple to heal the rifts

Mark Landler

For Barack Obama, whose relationship with the Israeli Prime Minister, Benjamin Netanyahu, has often resembled that of a couple trapped in a loveless marriage, the past three months must have offered some grim satisfaction.

In November, Obama won re-election over Mitt Romney, who had been the not-so-subtle favourite of Netanyahu. Then on Tuesday, Netanyahu stumbled in his own re-election bid, with his Likud Party holding enough seats to keep him in office but falling short of expectations in the face of surging centrist support.

Still, there was no crowing at the White House as the returns flowed in from Israel. Administration officials on Wednesday were reluctant to comment on how Netanyahu's setback may affect his relations with Obama, especially since the Israeli leader has not yet begun the work of cobbling together a governing coalition. But analysts said there was more than vindication for Obama in Israel's new political landscape.

Netanyahu's weakened position could set the stage for, if not a ''reset'', to use the administration's well-worn phrase, then an improvement in his ties with the President.

Advertisement

If, as some analysts expect, Netanyahu seeks to put together a centre-right coalition that includes Yair Lapid, whose Yesh Atid party surprisingly won 19 seats in the 120-seat parliament, it could sand away the roughest edges of Netanyahu's existing right-wing coalition.

Lapid could push a new government in directions that would ease longstanding sources of tension with Obama. He is more interested in creating jobs and providing housing than in expanding Jewish settlements in the West Bank, a recurring source of friction between Obama and Netanyahu.

And Netanyahu may be under less pressure to consider a unilateral strike on Iran over its nuclear program. That would be a relief to the White House, which has had to plead with the Israelis for patience while it pursues a last-ditch diplomatic effort with Tehran.

''A weaker Bibi [Netanyahu] heading a government with some centrists was the best outcome the White House could have hoped for,'' said Aaron David Miller, a Middle East negotiator. ''It gives them a better chance to avoid war with the Iranian mullahs and preserve the chance of a peace with the Palestinians.''

Israeli leaders - including Netanyahu during a previous stint as prime minister - have been punished by Israeli voters for mismanaging their relationships with US presidents, but analysts were reluctant to attribute too many of his troubles to Obama, given the complexities of an election that surprised even the experts.

As Martin Indyk, a former US ambassador to Israel, put it, ''the Israeli public cares about the relationship and it didn't help that he mishandled it and there was a reminder of how badly he mishandled it on the eve of the election''.

Almost no one predicts that a new Israeli government will suddenly allow Obama to rekindle his first-term goal of a peace agreement between the Israelis and Palestinians.

While Indyk said that John Kerry, who has been nominated to succeed Hillary Rodham Clinton as secretary of state, would make a game effort to preserve the two-state solution, he is no more likely to achieve a breakthrough than Clinton did.

Miller, now at the Woodrow Wilson International Centre for Scholars, said he had rarely seen a relationship as persistently dysfunctional as that between Obama and Netanyahu. A resounding Netanyahu victory would only have exacerbated those strains. Now, though, after his deflating victory, Netanyahu may have the chance to mend fences, Miller said.

''The good news for Bibi, if he manages to put it together, is that a broader government would ease tensions and make the next four years much less rocky,'' he said. ''Netanyahu will be able to preside over a much more functional relationship with the United States.''